Forgot to Laugh features top sideshow entertainers

Joe Meyers

Published 5:18 pm, Tuesday, November 5, 2013

Coney Island sword swallower Kryssy Kocktail is one of the acts scheduled for the 7th Annual Forgot to Laugh Sideshow and Animation Festival on Saturday, Nov. 9 at New Haven's Lyric Hall.
Photo: Contributed Photo

Coney Island sword swallower Kryssy Kocktail is one of the acts...

Audience volunteers will be part of the act when "The Great Throwdini" takes the stage at the Forgot to Laugh Sideshow and Animation Festival in New Haven on Saturday, Nov. 9.
Photo: Contributed Photo

Audience volunteers will be part of the act when "The Great...

A "human lie detector" - Kouros, The Man Who Knows - is among the neo-vaudeville acts on the bill Saturday, Nov. 9 at the Forgot to Laugh Sideshow and Animation Festival in New Haven.
Photo: Contributed Photo

A "human lie detector" - Kouros, The Man Who Knows - is among the...

More than a dozen short animated films - including one by "Lenore" comic book creator Roman Dirge (above) - will be shown as part of the Forgot to Laugh Sideshow and Animation Festival at New Haven's Lyric Hall on Saturday, Nov. 9.
Photo: Contributed Photo

Tiny Tim and his circus pals might be long gone, but the art of sideshow performing is alive and well.

"The Great Throwdini," "Leo the Human Gumby" and sword swallower "Kryssy Kocktail" are just three of the neo-sideshow performers who will appear at the 7th annual Forgot to Laugh: Sideshow and Animation Festival at New Haven's Lyric Hall on Saturday, Nov. 9.

The show is the brainstorm of artist and designer Tony Juliano of New Haven who runs the annual event under the name of his producer alter ego, "Tony Baloney."

"It's going to be a doozy of a show," Juliano said in a phone interview last week. "I'm quite proud of it because we have some amazing performers."

Juliano finds his talent via a submissions link on the show's website and he also makes regular trips to New York, especially the young sideshow throwbacks who perform in the "Coney Island U.S.A." shows in Coney Island, Brooklyn, N.Y.

Juliano said the knife thrower known as "The Great Throwdini" is listed in the Guinness Book of World Records for some of his stunts. He will be bringing with him his favorite "target girl" -- "Bad Ass" Lynn.

At one point in the set, Lynn will draw an audience volunteer into the act and add four strategic balloons for "Throwdini" to pop with his knives.

"We will make it clear at the start that no flash photos will be allowed because we don't want to distract the performers," Juliano said.

Forgot to Laugh will also include a mime -- "Chris the Mime" -- who is not your traditional, white-faced Marcel Marceau imitator.

"He's from England and talented in a very unusual way," Juliano said, obliquely. "He's not traditional at all."

The show is half live performance, half innovative animated films.

"We'll do it the way we always do it ... an emcee will open the show, we'll have 10 minutes of performances, four short animated films and then repeat," he said of the two-hour presentation.

The animated films this year will include new work by Oscar-winner Bill Plympton and a short by Roman Dirge, the creator of the comic book "Lenore."

The new Forgot to Laugh show will reflect a creator in a much more upbeat frame of mind than he was last year.

"I broke up with my girlfriend, I was unemployed for a few years ... but now I'm as happy as a pig in mud," Juliano said.

As far as the age-appropriateness of the show goes, Juliano said that while he would not describe Forgot to Laugh as family entertainment, "It's not that any of the shorts are inappropriate ... it just might be hard for kids to get some of them."